Problems converting MKV

[Kracov]

So apparently lots of video converters have problems converting MKV files.
Any Video Converter cannot convert certain MKV files. Also AVC seems to incorrectly convert dimensions. Some 1920x1080 videos would convert to 542x352 when I specified 626x352.
I did try MKVTOOLNIX but MKV files won't play in PS3.
Handbrake seems okay at encoding SRT but there's no way to add an opaque box or change font size.
I've heard of MP4Box but I don't know how to use it.

[LigH.de]

Your complaint doesn't help in the slightest.

No details for which target you want to convert (does it require a specific container format, video format, compatibility to specific devices?). No details about the content of those MKV files which are not supported by your tested converters. Aspect ratios are a matter of operating the used software correctly.

MKVToolnix and MP4Box will not convert video content in any way. They will only repack to another container.

[Hoser Rob]

Actually most all video converters will have problems if you have no idea how to use them. I hardly know where to start but I guess it should be that MKV is not a format, it's just a container that can have many video or audio formats.

Re PS3 file playback you should look at this: https://manuals.playstation.net/document/en/ps3/current/video/filetypes.html

[Kracov]

I usually try to convert them to MP4 x264 (no profile preset). And even trying to convert to a different format doesn't work. I vaguely remember posting about this problem previously, and someone mentioned that the index was broken and needed to be remuxed. And with all the help I got, I still couldn't remux them properly. So I always end up using Handbrake which works fine, but I was hoping to try again at using other programs.

[LigH.de]

MKV is not a format

It's not a content format, but a container format instead. The MKV container may contain a large variety of different content formats.

@Kracov:

Always quote any error message completely. Vague memories never help. Even better: Log files produced by the converter. They may even contain a MediaInfo analysis which may not show us if your file has holes in it later on, but will at least try to find and report important header values.

[cornemuse]

I had a hardware media player which would only 'see' MKV type videos. Biggest issue was the hoops to jump through in conversion. (iso/files to mkv) And I could see NO difference in quality (?) of image/sound vs ISO's/VIDEO_TS folders. I still dont see any benefit to MKV. Sorry, I'm not buying it, , , , ,

[lingyi]

When I buy a dozen cupcakes, each one individually boxed is harder to manage than the full dozen in a single larger box.

DVD .iso playback on a media player (internal or external) requires a license, which is why some players don't support it. In addition, Blu-Ray .ISO playback licensing is very strict and expensive, which is why very few media players support it.

Also, it's a generally a non-issue now, both in space and processing power, but there is additional overhead in a DVD/Blu-Ray .iso that is removed with .mkv. I just converted a 6GB movie from .vob(s) to .mkv and there was a 100MB reduction in file size that may be important to some.

[LigH.de]

ISO is not just a file. It is an image of a whole medium, including two file systems. It contains the whole physical content of a DVD Video, sector by sector by sector. To handle it, an application needs to treat it like a whole disc, interpret the UDF file system in it, read several single files out of this container. That means a lot of efforts. No surprise it can be too much for a consumer playback device. A disc image is so much more than just a video file.

But that's not the topic of this thread.

[Kracov]

LigHde, AVC doesn't have a logfile. what program should i use to get a logfile?

[gonca]

LigHde, AVC doesn't have a logfile. what program should i use to get a logfile?

Yes it does

[jagabo]

https://www.videohelp.com/software/MkvToMp4

[Kracov]

i tried that in AVC but no log was created

as for MKVtoMP4, this is what the log said:

ffms [error]: could not create video source
lavf [error]: could not find decoder for video stream
avs [error]: failed to load avisynth
raw [error]: raw input requires a resolution.
x264 [error]: could not open input file `C:/Users/Owner/Desktop/Heroes S04E10 - Brother's Keeper.mkv' via any method!
x264 terminated with error: 4294967295

[jagabo]

as for MKVtoMP4, this is what the log said:

ffms [error]: could not create video source
lavf [error]: could not find decoder for video stream
avs [error]: failed to load avisynth
raw [error]: raw input requires a resolution.
x264 [error]: could not open input file `C:/Users/Owner/Desktop/Heroes S04E10 - Brother's Keeper.mkv' via any method!
x264 terminated with error: 4294967295

I don't actually use the program but I'm pretty sure MKVtoMP4 cannot deliver those errors because it would not be using AviSynth or x264. You should open an MKV file and it will output an MP4 file without reencoding the video.

[Kracov]

After doing a little bit of searching, others seem to have problems with MKVtoMp4. My guess is either the program isn't the best, or my video is bad (like no index for example). It does say in the log "could not open input file"

[jagabo]

Did you post a MediInfo report of your file?

[Kracov]

no but here it is

General
Unique ID                      : 63907528843139518757704987483176230582 (0x30142470DBB26E63CC0E70184F44DEB6)
Complete name                  : C:\Users\Owner\Desktop\Heroes S04E10  Brother's Keeper.mkv
Format                         : Matroska
Format version                 : Version 4 / Version 2
File size                      : 1.50 GiB
Duration                       : 43 min 13 s
Overall bit rate               : 4 954 kb/s
Movie name                     : Heroes.S04E10.Thanksgiving.1080p.Bluray.Remux.VC-1.DTS-HD.MA.5.1-mkvGOD
Encoded date                   : UTC 2019-11-09 08:58:31
Writing application            : mkvmerge v20.0.0 ('I Am The Sun') 64-bit
Writing library                : libebml v1.3.5 + libmatroska v1.4.8
Writing frontend               : StaxRip v1.7.0.6

Video
ID                             : 1
Format                         : HEVC
Format/Info                    : High Efficiency Video Coding
Format profile                 : Main 10@L4@Main
Codec ID                       : V_MPEGH/ISO/HEVC
Duration                       : 43 min 13 s
Bit rate                       : 4 499 kb/s
Width                          : 1 920 pixels
Height                         : 1 080 pixels
Display aspect ratio           : 16:9
Frame rate mode                : Constant
Frame rate                     : 23.976 (24000/1001) FPS
Color space                    : YUV
Chroma subsampling             : 4:2:0
Bit depth                      : 10 bits
Bits/(Pixel*Frame)             : 0.090
Stream size                    : 1.36 GiB (91%)
Writing library                : x265 3.2+5-gfbe9fef31:[Windows][GCC 9.2.0][64 bit] 10bit
Encoding settings              : cpuid=1111039 / frame-threads=4 / numa-pools=16 / wpp / no-pmode / no-pme / no-psnr / no-ssim / log-level=2 / input-csp=1 / input-res=1920x1080 / interlace=0 / total-frames=62192 / level-idc=0 / high-tier=1 / uhd-bd=0 / ref=5 / no-allow-non-conformance / no-repeat-headers / annexb / no-aud / no-hrd / info / hash=0 / no-temporal-layers / open-gop / min-keyint=23 / keyint=250 / gop-lookahead=0 / bframes=8 / b-adapt=2 / b-pyramid / bframe-bias=0 / rc-lookahead=80 / lookahead-slices=4 / scenecut=40 / radl=0 / no-splice / no-intra-refresh / ctu=64 / min-cu-size=8 / no-rect / no-amp / max-tu-size=32 / tu-inter-depth=1 / tu-intra-depth=1 / limit-tu=0 / rdoq-level=2 / dynamic-rd=0.00 / no-ssim-rd / signhide / no-tskip / nr-intra=0 / nr-inter=0 / no-constrained-intra / no-strong-intra-smoothing / max-merge=3 / limit-refs=3 / limit-modes / me=3 / subme=5 / merange=57 / temporal-mvp / no-hme / weightp / no-weightb / no-analyze-src-pics / deblock=-3:-3 / no-sao / no-sao-non-deblock / rd=4 / selective-sao=0 / no-early-skip / rskip / no-fast-intra / no-tskip-fast / no-cu-lossless / no-b-intra / no-splitrd-skip / rdpenalty=0 / psy-rd=2.00 / psy-rdoq=1.00 / no-rd-refine / no-lossless / cbqpoffs=0 / crqpoffs=0 / rc=abr / bitrate=4500 / qcomp=0.60 / qpstep=4 / stats-write=0 / stats-read=2 / cplxblur=20.0 / qblur=0.5 / ipratio=1.40 / pbratio=1.30 / aq-mode=3 / aq-strength=1.00 / cutree / zone-count=0 / no-strict-cbr / qg-size=32 / no-rc-grain / qpmax=69 / qpmin=0 / no-const-vbv / sar=0 / overscan=0 / videoformat=5 / range=0 / colorprim=2 / transfer=2 / colormatrix=2 / chromaloc=0 / display-window=0 / cll=0,0 / min-luma=0 / max-luma=1023 / log2-max-poc-lsb=8 / vui-timing-info / vui-hrd-info / slices=1 / no-opt-qp-pps / no-opt-ref-list-length-pps / no-multi-pass-opt-rps / scenecut-bias=0.05 / no-opt-cu-delta-qp / no-aq-motion / no-hdr / no-hdr-opt / no-dhdr10-opt / no-idr-recovery-sei / analysis-reuse-level=5 / scale-factor=0 / refine-intra=0 / refine-inter=0 / refine-mv=1 / refine-ctu-distortion=0 / no-limit-sao / ctu-info=0 / no-lowpass-dct / refine-analysis-type=0 / copy-pic=1 / max-ausize-factor=1.0 / no-dynamic-refine / no-single-sei / no-hevc-aq / no-svt / no-field / qp-adaptation-range=1.00
Default                        : Yes
Forced                         : No

Audio
ID                             : 2
Format                         : AAC LC
Format/Info                    : Advanced Audio Codec Low Complexity
Codec ID                       : A_AAC-2
Duration                       : 43 min 13 s
Bit rate                       : 416 kb/s
Channel(s)                     : 6 channels
Channel layout                 : C L R Ls Rs LFE
Sampling rate                  : 48.0 kHz
Frame rate                     : 46.875 FPS (1024 SPF)
Compression mode               : Lossy
Delay relative to video        : 20 ms
Stream size                    : 129 MiB (8%)
Language                       : English
Default                        : Yes
Forced                         : No

Text #1
ID                             : 3
Format                         : PGS
Muxing mode                    : zlib
Codec ID                       : S_HDMV/PGS
Codec ID/Info                  : Picture based subtitle format used on BDs/HD-DVDs
Duration                       : 42 min 24 s
Bit rate                       : 49.6 kb/s
Count of elements              : 1446
Stream size                    : 15.1 MiB (1%)
Language                       : English
Default                        : No
Forced                         : No

Text #2
ID                             : 4
Format                         : PGS
Muxing mode                    : zlib
Codec ID                       : S_HDMV/PGS
Codec ID/Info                  : Picture based subtitle format used on BDs/HD-DVDs
Duration                       : 42 min 34 s
Bit rate                       : 38.9 kb/s
Count of elements              : 1176
Stream size                    : 11.9 MiB (1%)
Language                       : Spanish
Default                        : No
Forced                         : No

Text #3
ID                             : 5
Format                         : PGS
Muxing mode                    : zlib
Codec ID                       : S_HDMV/PGS
Codec ID/Info                  : Picture based subtitle format used on BDs/HD-DVDs
Duration                       : 42 min 34 s
Bit rate                       : 45.0 kb/s
Count of elements              : 1176
Stream size                    : 13.7 MiB (1%)
Language                       : French
Default                        : No
Forced                         : No

Menu
00:00:00.000                   : en:Chapter 01
00:09:33.281                   : en:Chapter 02
00:24:32.096                   : en:Chapter 03
00:37:13.982                   : en:Chapter 04

[jagabo]

So the file really is an MKV file. Maybe MKVtoMP4 doesn't work with 10 bit HEVC?

[zizouillette]

MKVtoMP4 never works
Tested a lot of times with severals mkv and always crashing.
I always convert my MKV with XVID4PSP whith minor problems

[jagabo]

I'm sorry -- I was wrong about MKVtoMP4 not being able to reencode. I had it confused with another program. I downloaded the portable 64 bit version and used it to convert an HEVC+ACC MKV file to AVC+AAC MP4. It worked fine.

Some other things to try:

Remux with MkvToolnix. Maybe there's something about the way the streams are currently muxed that's giving other programs problems. Then reencode the new MKV to AVC+AAC in MP4.

You can also try remuxing to MP4 with ffmpeg:

ffmpeg -i "input.mkv" -vcodec copy -acodec copy "output.mp4"

But the PS3 will not play 10 bit HEVC. You'll still need to reencode to AVC.

You should be able to reencode the original MKV with ffmpeg:

ffmpeg -i "input.mkv" -vcodec libx264 -crf 18 -preset veryfast -acodec copy "output.mp4"

The result of that should play in the PS3.